Contra Costa will go after $80 million state grant for Richmond jail expansion

MARTINEZ -- Contra Costa County will go after an $80 million state grant to build a new 240-cell high-security wing at the Richmond jail that offers ample room for services intended to reduce the numbers of repeat offenders.

The county board of supervisors on Tuesday unanimously endorsed Sheriff David Livingston's request for permission to submit by the Oct. 24 deadline an application with the California Board of State and Community Corrections, which oversees a $500 million pool state legislators earmarked for improved inmate treatment programs.

With the growing emphasis on reducing the alarming rates at which inmates are released from custody only to recommit crimes and return, the new facility would allow the sheriff to move high-security inmates from the Martinez jail -- which lacks room to expand re-entry services -- to its existing Richmond detention campus where the county has lots of programs but only minimum security cells.

"This (grant) is a unique opportunity that has presented itself," Livingston told the supervisors. "We are not looking to fill cells with new offenders. This a movement of inmates to a facility where we can safely provide services."

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Contrary to Livingston's smaller cell-only expansion proposal of a year ago which drew busloads of vocal opponents, the handful of social justice activists who spoke Tuesday generally praised the sheriff's new plan. The grant would be use to build a 128,000-square-foot West Contra Costa County Reentry and Detention Facility with 20,000 square feet of classrooms and program space.

But CISCO Executive Director Adam Kruggel did question whether the sheriff needs 240 additional cells and said he worried the number could hurt the county's chances of winning the money. Contra Costa will compete with applications from among the state's other 11 large counties although it is unknown how many will submit proposals.

"We think the county would have a more competitive proposal if they proposed renovating or replacing (cells) rather than expanding," Kruggel said. "It would be terrible to lose the grant because of a noncompetitive application."

Supervisor John Gioia of Richmond echoed Kruggel's concerns.

"I will support the grant application but given the state's intended purpose for these funds, I'm not supportive of a facility of this size at this point," Gioia said. "We will need to have a lot more discussion."

Livingston, his top management staff and a hired consultant universally characterized 240 cells as a balanced approach.

On any given day, the county has 650 high security inmates, designed as such due to gang affiliations, the types of crimes involved or mental health issues. The county has only 53 high security beds in Martinez which means the county must mix those inmates with the general prisoner population, explained Undersheriff Mike Casten.

Officials cannot move the high risk inmates to the minimum security Richmond jail, where the inmates have keys to their own cells in the dormitory-style buildings, the doors are wood and the walls are Sheetrock, Casten said.

Not all high-risk inmates would be candidates for the new re-entry center for a variety of reasons but the addition of 240 cells into the mix would "go a long way toward providing a much larger percentage of inmate population with critical services," Casten said.

Services currently offered in Richmond include a broad variety of general education classes, computer laboratories and instruction, landscape design and maintenance courses plus job coaching. The Martinez jail has no classrooms but does accommodate instructors for inmates who sign up for independent study.

The grant will require the county pitch in nearly $9 million of the total estimated $88.9 million project cost. The sheriff proposes the balance of the money come from his department's budget and $2.9 million in other state dollars earmarked for the costs of supervising felons that previously went to state prison. If the grant is approved and construction proceeds on schedule, the new re-entry center and jail would open in March 2019.